Winning
by Sakura.x.Blossom
Summary: Because winning isn't the same without someone to celebrate your victory on. And nothing screams triumph quite like the smell of blood in the morning... torture, character death, dark, mild OroSaku but in a Predator/Prey sort of way.


I wrote the beginning, and Yardil wrote the end. Oh, and yeah, I don't own the characters. (Surprising, no?)

* * *

"_How quickly life fades; like falling blossoms from a tree..."_

The prey—_his sweet _flower, he muses affectionately and steps over the Kyuubi brat's smoking corpse—does not move as he approaches slowly. He ignores the blood dripping off of his hands and the specks of it decorating his face and clothing like odd polka dots. The prey whimpers quietly. He smiles, bearing bloody fangs at his flower.

The walk towards her is slow, calculated. He plans to enjoy himself with the surviving member of the fated Team Kakashi. The shaking, terrified girl—he doesn't know her name, he thinks and frowns—starts to cry when he is close enough to reach out with Kusanagi and stab her to death. But he doesn't want her to die just yet, oh no. That would ruin the _fun_.

"_Tell me, little one, what is your name?"_

His soft croon is enough to snap her out of her stupor. She screams, runs and becomes prey again. He lets her run before he grows bored and catches her, pulling her backwards into him with his tongue wrapped around her throat.

"_No!"_

She screams loudly—and he only just stops from killing her here and now—and kicks and scratches before he wraps her up into his arms, twisting the kind gesture into a near death-lock.

"_I asked you a question."_

He waits for her to reply. She gurgles like a drowning child, and then he remembers he's cutting off her air. He moves his arm slightly, allowing her to breathe, a few minute gulps of air and then he makes his demand once more.

"_Your name?"_ He is impatient now, if he hadn't been before...

_"My... my ...name?"_ In the few seconds she has left of her life she has two options that might make her situation better. Firstly she can give her name; this could prolong her life somewhat and give her some chance of escape. The second option simply makes her death more worthwhile, that is, coming out with some great one-liner that ensures her place in the annals of history. However, it is testimony to her spirit, and indeed, her lack of intelligence, that her last words can be recorded as 'My... my ...name?', with two or three minutes of incomprehensible screaming following. The gory details of the last minutes of her life run roughly like this; as she chokes out her last words his mask of amicability slips and he brings his hand back across her throat in a suffocating lock. But then, a nice, peaceful, painless death is far too pleasant. She screams; he punctures some vital organ in her lower stomach. Wordless, voiceless, soundless, _helpless_, she writhes in beautiful agony as he tears away at her back, tiny, piercing pains everywhere. Then a throw: not to hard, not too soft. She breaks three ribs on the right, one on the left. He walks up, putting all his weight on her left hand. The bones crack audibly and he slides the flat of his blade across her neck. Mercy? No! ... a thin cut, then his sword slices up, taking her ear in a clean stroke. Sadly there's no time to leave the wounds for infection... pity.

Her breathing is feverish. Lovely.

He looks her up and down appraisingly. Surely he's done enough, but no... Her legs lie, straight, pure and clean beneath the wreck of her body. A soft hiss escapes as he turns to cut straight through the left tendon. Several kunai stab into the soles of her feet; they sink deep and when he rips them from her body they tear flesh. She can't scream, it's too far; the pain seeping through her body is too much to bear. He stops, all at once.

"_You can't _feel_ it anymore."_ He murmurs, almost disappointedly, _"To do anymore would be a waste."_

No more? Too good to be true. She sighs, relieved, tension sliding away from her. In that instant he goes in for one final cut, nape to navel. She screams in shock, the pain renewed. In the last few seconds before she fades into the abyss his face hovers in front of hers, mocking, gloating, _triumphant_ and he has won.


End file.
